Issue No. 76 - October 2007
In this issue:
o Overview
o UN Perspectives: Dr. Ezzedine Boutrif
o UNAs and the Right to Food
o NGOs on the Move
o Book Recommendation
o Film Recommendations
Message from WFUNA President Hans Blix
 "The simple fact is that the world needs an organization that is universal; there currently exists no alternative. The more interdependent the people of the world become, the more we need to establish joint institutions. The UN is an indispensable institution - an integral instrument within our global village. We therefore, need to devote ourselves to the study of global issues". Dr. Hans Blix, President, to the 193rd Executive Committee meeting in September 2007 hosted by UNA-China in Beijing.
In September, Dr. Blix was invited by Former President Bill Clinton to the Faroese Islands where they met with political and fishing leaders to discuss the growing concerns over the future survival of global fish stocks. Mr. Clinton made a point of saying that rather than globalization, he preferred the term interdependence which applied to fishing and other environmental issues.
Opening of the 62nd General Assembly
 At the opening of the UN General Assembly's 62nd session, the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon spoke about A Stronger United Nations for a Better World. He said that he expected the year ahead would be "among the most challenging in our history….(.and was) sure that, together, we can make it one of the most successful. ….The pendulum of history is swinging in our favor. Multilateralism is back. An increasingly interdependent world recognizes that the challenges of tomorrow are best dealt with through the UN. Indeed, they can only be dealt with through the UN."
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Who's Who at the UN
Ahmedou Ould Abdallah has been appointed Special Representative for Somalia.
 Italian author and journalist Anna Cataldi, a former UN Messenger of Peace, was appointed Ambassador of the Stop TB Partnership. The purpose is to raise global awareness about the consequences of tuberculosis on refugees, migrants, and people living in poverty.
Serbian tennis players Ana Ivanovic and Jelena Jankovic, have been named as National Ambassadors for UNICEF, Serbia.
Spanish prosecutor and judge, Carlos Castresana Fernández, has been selected as head of the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala.
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appointed the former environment minister from Benin, Luc Gnacadja, as the new Executive Secretary of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification.
Marjatta Rasi of Finland has been selected to serve as the first chair of the advisory group to the UN fund set up to help meet the needs of countries emerging from conflict.
What's Happening at the UN
Read the message from the Secretary-General on the International Day of Older Persons (1 October) www.un.org/esa/socdev/ageing/documents/Intlday/sg_msg07.pdf
Second International Conference on Climate Change and Tourism
1-3 October 2007, Davos, Switzerland
General Assembly, High-level Dialogue on Inter-religious and Intercultural Understanding and Cooperation for Peace
4 - 5 October , New York
General Assembly, high-level dialogue on financing for development
22 - 23 October , New York
Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization, twenty-ninth session
12 - 15 November, Vienna
United Nations Climate Change Conference
3-14 December 2007, Nusa Dua, Bali
2008 was declared by the General Assembly as the International Year of the Potato.
UN Partnerships in Action: The Three Tiers
 Commissioned by the Simons Foundation, the Global Public Opinion Poll on Nuclear Weapons gives insights into the opinions of citizens of six nations: Britain, France, Italy, Germany, USA and Israel. It is a must-read for anyone interested in nuclear issues:
www.angusreidstrategies.com/uploads/pages/pdfs/Simons%20Report.pdf
New Youth Report on Children and Armed Conflict
 In October, the "Machel Strategic Review" will be presented to the General Assembly to assess the progress made since the groundbreaking 1996 study on the protection of children in armed conflict, prepared for the UN by Graca Machel. A separate youth report was prepared by one of WFUNA's partner organizations, the Global Youth Action Network in collaboration with UNICEF and UNFPA. Through focus groups and on-line surveys, the report gathered the views and concerns of 1700 children from 92 countries, the majority of whom are affected by armed conflict. You can find the report and more background information at www.unicef.org/voy/takeaction/takeaction_3954.html. You can support the message of the report by endorsing their demands on TakingITGlobal: http://petitions.takingitglobal.org/Machel
 The 2007 theme for the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty is People Living in Poverty as Agents of Change: 20th Anniversary of the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty. A series of events are planned at UNHQ to commemorate the day, in recognition of the role of the International Day as a tool for the eradication of poverty. www.oct17.org
STAND UP Against Poverty and for the MDGs 2007
U NAs around the world will be joining the UN Millennium Campaign on 16 and 17 October in their efforts to break the Guinness World Record for the largest number of people to STAND UP Against Poverty, and for the Millennium Development Goals. Last year, more then 23 million people in 87 countries stood up and took action to remind governments of the promise that they made in 2000. The goal is to double this number in 2007. The UNA-Dominican Republic, for example, is planning to organize STAND UP as part of their Model UN conference in October. All of the near 3,000 participants will gather to STAND UP, and this will be documented in photos and video. Over 50,000 people from the following UNAs will be participating in STAND UP: Belgium, Benin, Canada, Dominican Republic, Liberia, Malaysia, Norway, Sierra Leone, Turkey, and Uganda.
We ask all UNAs planning STAND UP events to register them at: www.standagainstpoverty.org
 CIVICUS launched a new report on the effectiveness of civil society organisations' influence on national policy making:
www.civicus.org/new/media/PGSADCStudyJune2007.pdf
CIVICUS Secretary-General Kumi Naidoo hosted a small meeting to discuss civil society collaboration in support of the STAND UP campaign in NY on Friday 28 September.
 In its' Fifth Special Session on the human rights situation in Myanmar on 2 October 2007, the Human Rights Council adopted a resolution strongly deploring continued violent repression of peaceful demonstrations:
www.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrcouncil/specialsession/5/index.htm
Civil society organizations, such as Amnesty International, UN Watch, and Human Rights Watch have been actively informing and mobilizing the international community on this issue, and spoke at the Special Session of the Human Rights Council.
 The Coalition for the International Criminal Court is a global network of over 2,500 non-governmental organizations advocating for a fair, effective and independent International Criminal Court (ICC). They have created a monthly calendar that lists ICC-related events around the world. To see what is happening in October, go to:
http://iccnow.org/?mod=currentevents
WFUNA Highlights
WFUNA SG, Pera Wells, participated in the World Women's Forum: "Defining Leadership and Success" in Seoul, Republic of Korea from 12 -1 4 September, where she moderated a panel of women leaders from Iran, Iraq, Palestine and Sudan. The Forum was designed to promote a better quality of life for women everywhere while presenting a new model of woman's leadership, management strategies, social responsibilities, and best practices to cultivate the next generation of woman leaders. www.womanforum.org
UN Chess Tournament in Armenia
In an effort to bring together local UN representatives, government leaders, and NGO representatives, on 29 September the UNA-Armenia organized a UN Chess Cup Tournament. Amongst others, the players included the Prime Minister of Armenia, the local DPI representative, the President of the UNA, and the Minister of Sports and Youth in the country.
UNA-Mexico Revitalizing
Since Mr. Pepe Rivera took on the leadership of the UNA-Mexico four months ago, the UNA has implemented several new projects including:
" The Mexican Sports in a Box in cooperation with UNA-Canada
" A photo-workshop for indigenous children that teaches them how to use digital cameras to find their identity and that of their communities as well as skills to earn income by documenting social events and daily activities within their communities;
" A recycling program for large apartment complexes where the UNA teaches tenants how to recycle and provides basic infrastructure such as recycling containers.
" A national Model UN coordination strategy, where the UNA provides tools for decentralized coordination and provides training for moderators and organizers, including the WorldMUN which will be held in Mexico next year;
" The Millennium Professors campaign which will feed into the STAND UP Against Poverty project where professors will make a commitment to incorporating the MDGs into their study programs through-out the year.
Second WFUNA-youth Capacity Building Seminar
Funded by the UNA-UK with the support of the Oxford Model United Nations, WFUNA-youth will conduct its second Project Management Capacity Building Seminar. It will take place from the 31 October to 1 November in Oxford, right before the Oxford University Model UN conference. After the workshop, participants can take part in the Model UN.
 UNA UK will provide funding for the presenters and participants from Latvia, Serbia and Azerbaijan. Just as in Barcelona, participants from other UNYAs will be able to attend. In order to apply for participation and funding UNYA members had to design a UN related project which they will carry out in their home countries within three months after their return. This concept was successfully applied at the Barcelona Capacity Building Seminar. Many of the projects designed there have been carried out afterwards. Among them: the first ever Model UN conference in Estonia, a UN-information campaign for young people in Bulgaria and an MDG campaign in the UK, in which universities evaluate the effectiveness of UK policy towards reaching the MDGs.
Out now: The WFUNA-youth UNYA Project Management Handbook
This handbook aims at giving UNYAs a step-by-step explanation of a few simple but effective projects that can be executed by established UNYAs all over the world. Suggested projects include organizing an essay competition, a speaker event, or teaching about the UN in high schools. An electronic version of this handbook is available at www.wfuna-youth.org in the projects section. You can adapt the template given in this handbook to your own projects needs.
 The UNA-Dominican Republic is hosting the 1st Latin American and Caribbean Regional Model United Nations Conference under the auspices of the World Federation of United Nations Associations at the Barceló Bávaro Convention Center on October 10th to 14th 2007 in the context of the International Conference of the Americas - CILA 2007, which will simulate 14 different organs and commissions of the United Nations and other regional and international multilateral institutions. There will be a regional UNA representatives meeting in conjunction with the Model UN. Delegations have registered from the following UNAs: Barbados, Bolivia, Cuba, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Mexico, Peru, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago and Venezuela. For details, go to: www.wfuna.org/what/education/upcoming_model_un_events/mun_americas.cfm
New Faces at the Secretariat
 Amy Ko is currently a senior at the New York University Stern School of Business, co-majoring in Marketing and International Business with a minor in South Asian studies. A recent StartingBloc fellow, she has an avid interest in social entrepreneurship, human rights advocacy, development and globalization studies and is looking forward to a career in the nonprofit sector. In addition, Amy is a fan of rock music, reading, and crafts.
 Nicole Salazar is an undergraduate student at the Albert E. Nerken School of Engineering in The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. Having just started her internship with the World Federation of United Nations Associations, she is currently working on Spanish - English translations. Coming from an Egyptian-Peruvian household, her regional interests are the Middle East and Latin America.
 Michal Vaisben
recently graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and Political Science from Purchase College, State University of New York. She is interested in global development, poverty, and human rights, particularly women's rights. Originally from Israel, Michal moved to New York six years ago in order to pursue her dream of working at the United Nations. Michal likes to travel around the world, learn new languages, read, and listen to music.
 Marcus Wilson is a graduate of the University of Canterbury in New Zealand, where he completed his MA in History. After spending most of his time researching war and military strategy, he now hopes to begin a life of preventing conflict; after all, "to know where we are going, we must first know where we have been".
Millennium Project News
 During the DPI-NGO conference, Millennium Project director Jerome Glenn gave a one-hour briefing to the incoming President of the UN General Assembly on the 2007 State of the Future Report with special attention to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Kiyotaka Akasaka, UN Under-Secretary-General for Communications and Public Information hosted the launch of the report at the UN bookstore. After wire stories by AP and AFP about 100 articles were published about the release of the 2007 State of the Future Report.
The Millennium Project is currently creating a list of future-oriented government strategy units (your help in your countries is most welcome) that is being compiled in hopes that they might be connected with similar units in UN agencies, the UN Secretary General's Office, and office of the President of the General Assembly. An initial feasibility study for a global energy information system is underway. (2007 State of the Future is an independent publication not necessarily reflecting the views of WFUNA or its member UNAs)
Topic of the Month: the Right to Food
Overview on the Right to Food
 Currently, more than 852 million people in the world are still deprived of enough food. The theme for this year's World Food Day (16 October) is "The Right to Food". The Right to Food is the right to feed oneself in dignity. It is the right of every person to have regular access to sufficient, high-quality and culturally acceptable food in order to lead healthy and active lives. In 1948, the UN Declaration of Human Rights acknowledged this right, determining that food security plays a critical role in national development and in fulfilling global aspirations for an improved standard of living for all.
Achieving food security has been at the core of the Food and Agricultural Organization's (FAO) efforts since its inception in 1945. The FAO held the first UN World Food Conference in Rome in 1974, where it proclaimed food security an "inalienable right of every man, woman and child". The conference set as its goal the eradication of hunger, malnutrition and food insecurity within a decade, but sixty years down the line this goal has still not been achieved.
In November 1996, as a result of an emerging consensus to renew the commitment to achieving food security for all, the FAO held the first World Food Summit. For the first time in the fifty years of FAO's existence, the imperative of eradicating hunger was considered serious and complex enough to be dealt with by the highest leaders of member states.
Experience has shown that the issue of food and nutrition cannot be addressed in isolation. Last year, in the week marking both World Poverty Eradication Day and World Food Day, former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan called for simultaneous action on hunger and poverty. He warned that it would be impossible to eradicate one blight without the other, 'a hungry man cannot think beyond his next meal…this has devastating consequences for the economic and social development of society as a whole.'
To read entire article, please click here>>>>
UN Perspectives: Dr. Ezzeddine Boutrif
 Food safety and quality control often becomes a topic of interest for the general public when food crises such as an outbreak of mad cow disease, or the recent problem with acrylamide contamination in potato chips and other starchy foods arises. However, food safety and quality is a concern of international scope that has an effect on social, economic and political spheres. In the framework of the United Nations, the two agencies that primarily collaborate to focus on these issues are the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). Within FAO in Rome, the Food Quality and Standards Service (AGNS) is the Service committed to the enhancement of food safety and quality along the food chain at international, regional and national levels, with the aim of protecting consumers and promoting the production and trade of safe, quality food.
 After nearly 30 years of work within FAO, Dr. Ezzeddine Boutrif was recently appointed Director of the Nutrition and Consumer Protection Division (AGN). Dr. Boutrif's career at the UN began at the Junior Officer level at FAO in 1978, and he has successively held positions of higher responsibility at the agency, being promoted in 1991 to Senior Officer and subsequently Service Chief of the Food Quality and Standards Service (AGNS) in 2004.
To read entire article and full interview with Dr. Boutrif, please click here>>>>
UNAs and the Right to Food
UNA-Cameroon in partnership with HINT International Cameroon Branch, is conducting a program called Food For Fund. Participants in this program bring along as many people as they can for a meal. At this gathering, people eat together and discuss ways to effectively end hunger and improve food nutrition in the world as well as make donations that will go to projects on food security and nutrition.
UNA-Uganda runs a Goat and Piggery project in its two community branches (Mityana and Mukono). The project is aimed at poverty eradication and as a source of food and nutrition for orphans and disadvantaged children in those communities.
UNA-Norway disseminates information and educates students in schools and universities about the importance of food and nutrition with a special focus on MDG 1, and how it has been a conflict trigger in various parts of the world..
 UNA-Sweden carries out a campaign in cooperation with the WFP School Feeding Programme. They offer poor children free lunch at school, something which has several positive effects for the children themselves as well as for their families, communities and countries. The Swedish school feeding campaign cooperates with well-known Swedish restaurants and the coffee shop Barista Fair Trade Coffee.
NGOs on the Move
The Right to Food
NGOs have an important role to play in articulating and improving the quality and safety of food as well as food policies, especially nutrition habits. They provide services to rural producers and promote the growth of strong, effective and representative peoples' organizations. They are often at the forefront of experimentation with new approaches.
 Through their area Development Programs, World Vision is reaching communities across Nepal with initiatives to provide more and better food. Over 70 farmers in Naulo Abhas have now adopted permaculture: an organic farming technique ideally suited to Nepal's hilly slopes and varied climate. In other areas, workshops in commercial vegetable farming are teaching community groups about crop rotation and seasonal price fluctuations, to give them year-round harvests. www.wvasiapacific.org/nepal
 In Indonesia, Project Concern International is addressing the most critical health needs of more than 120,000 infants, children, women, and their families. They are improving the health and nutrition of vulnerable families in 30 villages by ensuring better access to quality maternal and child health care services. PCI is also bringing clean drinking water and better sanitation to more than 100 rural villages. www.projectconcern.org/site
The McKnight Foundation's Collaborative Crop Research Program has funded eight agriculture research projects in the Andes of Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia, working to improve food security. It provides technical support to the projects on matters related to health and nutrition, and study design. http://healthbridge.ca/food_mcknight_ecuador_e.cfm
 Africare works to improve the quality of life in Africa, with programs in food, water, the environment, health, emergency humanitarian aid, private-sector development and governance. It trains village groups and regional/national health personnel in family nutrition and supports village-based projects to improve nutrition through better food production. www.africare.org
Book Recommendation:
 Halving Hunger: It Can Be Done
UN Millennium Project/ United Nations Development Programme
In 2002, the UN Millennium Project established the Task Force on Hunger and assigned it to develop a strategy for halving world hunger by 2015.
Published in 2005, this report describes the task force's recommendations and interventions for achieving this target. The report examines current world progress towards eliminating hunger, and calls for the implementation of seven recommendations in the areas of: political action; national policy reforms; increased agricultural productivity for food-insecure farmers; improved nutrition for the chronically hungry; productive safety nets for the acutely hungry; improved rural incomes and markets; and restoration and conservation of natural resources essential for food security.
The book is part of the UN Millennium Development Library Series.
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